Track Employees’ Provident Fund claim status on the Net

A new job includes lots of paperwork and signing various documents provided by the new employer. Among the pile of papers are the provident fund transfer form (Form 13) or withdrawal form (Form 19). Though we duly fill one of these forms, we are often clueless if the request has been processed.

Knowing the status has become more prudent as starting Friday, a dormant Employees’ Provident Fund (EPF) account, which has not received any contribution for at least 36 months, will not be credited the stipulated interest amount. For the fiscal year 2011, an interest of 9.5% has been decided upon. So, it’s time to track your EPF account.

Online solution

The Employees’ Provident Fund Organisation (EPFO) provides a facility to check the claim status online (www.epfindia.com). S. Chatterjee, central provident fund commissioner, EPFO, says, “There have been more than 200,000 hits on the website till date. We are also working on making the EPF settlements faster.”

What to do: Visit the website and click the “know your claim status” hyperlink. Select the regional provident fund office with which the employer maintains these accounts and key in the EPF account number. Within minutes, the status of the account will appear on the screen.

The information: In case of withdrawal, information regarding whether the account is settled or not can be known. If applied for transfer of funds or withdrawal of Employee Pension Scheme, through Form 10C, the application status—whether in process or settled—can be known. Claim status for Employee Deposit Insurance Scheme can also be obtained.

Also, these can be checked online at the website of the regional EPFO. For instance, www.epfbng.kar.nic.in is the regional EPFO website for Bangalore. Some regional offices, such as Mangalore and Goa, also provide the facility to check online the balance in EPF accounts.

Mobile alerts: While filing the EPF form, mobile number can be provided along with a photocopy of the first page of the bank passbook. The day the claim request is received by the EPFO, it would send an SMS stating that the application has been received.

In fact, if applied for withdrawal of EPF, an SMS stating that the mentioned savings account has been credited with the settled amount is sent on the mobile number furnished.

Says Chatterjee, “Transfer of EPF money has become electronic and authorization request and claim settlement intimation is getting computerized and personnel are being trained. In about two-three months, it will take not more than 10 days for account settlement.”

As of now out of the 120 EPF offices across the country, 118 provide these online facilities and within a few months, the remaining two offices would also follow suit.